CASTING ACROSS THE WATER: MARC HIRSCHFELD…NBC’S EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF CASTING.

Marc Hirschfeld has been NBC’s executive vice president of casting since June 1999. He began his career in the entertainment industry working for Norman Lear’s Embassy Television as director of talent. Following this he established the highly successful casting office Liberman /Hirschfeld, which he founded with partner Meg Liberman. Here he won an Emmy award for Outstanding Casting for a Miniseries or a Movie for his work on ‘From the Earth to the Moon’ and six Artios Awards for outstanding achievements in comedy episodic, pilot and daytime casting. He was also nominated for several Emmy Awards for casting NBC’s hit comedy series ‘Seinfeld’. In addition he was responsible for casting the ensembles of many of the most popular series of recent times, such as ‘3^rd Rock from the Sun’and ‘Newsradio’ (NBC), ‘The Larry Sanders Show’ (HBO), ‘The Nanny’ (CBS) and ‘Party of Five’, ‘Married…with Children’ and ‘Mad TV’ for Fox. Liberman / Hirschfeld also cast television series such as ‘Dilbert’ for UPN, ‘That 70’s Show’ and ‘It’s Gary Shandling’s Show ‘ for Fox, ‘The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd for NBC , ‘The Drew Carey Show’, ‘The Norm Show’, ‘The Wonder Years’ and ‘It’s like, you know… for ABC  and several feature films such as ‘The X-Files: Fight the Future’. AUSUS Magazine spoke to Marc about what is involved in the casting process, his work with Australian casting directors and where he finds his talent.

Q: How did you come to collaborate with overseas casting directors?

There is so much production happening in the United States that our talent pool can get stretched very thin. It can be difficult to find actors that are charismatic enough to carry a series, so at some point we began to look beyond our own shores, to other countries such as Australia and Canada. With Australia, for example, we looked at several casting directors but eventually decided to work with a lady named Ann Fay of Maura Fay casting in Sydney. We chose her because she had the resources that we needed and access to many, many talented actors working there. Last year was actually the first year we had a casting director retained overseas. We had one in Australia, one in the UK and one in Canada.

Q: How do you maintain that relationship?

Lots of e-mails, phone calls and faxes. We send Ann all our pilot scripts after we’ve read them and see if she has any suggestions. We usually look for leads aged around 25 to 40. That’s our bread and butter. If she has someone she’ll videotape them and send the tape over. Sometimes we’ll look at demo tapes. If we like what we see we may fly an actor over to meet him.

Q: How do you make the decision to bring over Australian actors to the U.S?

There’s a few factors involved. Firstly, we must have exhausted our resources here. Secondly, we have to be able to find exactly the right actor. Casting is a very subjective process. I look for an actor who can inhabit a role effortlessly, someone who has that ‘something special’. And thirdly there is the cost factor. Is it worth it financially to relocate the actor? For this reason we usually only look at importing the leads.

Q: What recent co productions have you worked on?

‘Future Tense’ was the last production. It was shot in Queensland and starred an Australian actor I like named Robert Mammone. We also tested one actor over there for a television series based on the rock group ‘The Monkeys’ but that didn’t get made. Last season several Australian actors came close to being cast but eventually no one was brought over.

Q: How important is it for the foreign actors to be able to do the American accent?

It helps if they can do a good American accent. We’re still open to other accents but if they can ‘be American’ it just gives them more range and more possibility of getting the part.

Q: Where do you find new talent?

Everywhere.  We actively seek new talent of any age, with or without representation. I, or someone from my office, will see theater every night of the week. We pick the pieces we see either through word of mouth, or the actors themselves approaching us, or just pieces that we’re interested in. I’ve been as far as the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and this year I’ll go to the Aspen Comedy Festival. I’ve seen a lot of mediocre projects but also a lot of great stuff as well. For example at Edinburgh I saw a couple of acts I really liked. Adam Hills, a stand up comic and a folk music comedy duo, Flight of the Concords, who were nominated for a Perrier award. When I see performers that I enjoy I file them away in my mental filing cabinet. There might not be a part for them now but that could change in the future. I also rely on my casting staff to bring me people.

Q: What is the future of overseas casting?

Virtual auditions. The technology is improving so rapidly that eventually I will be able to simply sit in my office and watch actors audition live anywhere in the world. I think there’s something like a ten second delay but this is terrific. It means I can give them any adjustments immediately. And it saves costs on flying people over here.

Q: Is there any downtime in your job?

Not really. It’s hectic.  I work constantly on developing new projects and supervising current ones. As soon as one season is announced I start looking at the next season. We immediately start making deals with talent and begin writing new scripts. Fortunately I have a good team that I can rely on.

Q: What does the future hold for you?